Pilot jumps from own plane before crash

Story highlights

Kinmartin says he wants to sky-dive again -- next time on a tandem jump

21-year-old pilot forced to jump from his own plane after sky diver damaged plane

Kinmartin pointed his plane toward farmland, and jumped

Although ShawnKinmartinflies planes for a sky diving service, he hadn't done any sky diving himself.

But on Saturday he didn't have a choice. The 21-year-old's Cessna had been seriously damaged when a sky diver jumped out and hit a key piece of the aircraft, Kinmartin explained on CNN's "New Day" on Monday morning.

To have a shot at survival, he'd have to jump.

But before the heart-pumping moment, Kinmartin tried to steady his plane, cruising at 11,500 feet over eastern Missouri and southern Illinois.

A fellow pilot flew up in another plane to help assess the damage. The pilot checked out Kinmartin's plane and signaled to him that the tail was badly bent.

Sky diver kicks baseball player in face

Just Watched

See this sky dive go terribly wrong

Hopes of an emergency landing at an airport in Festus, Missouri, about 35 miles south of St. Louis, were dashed.

"We realized that I wouldn't be able to perform the landing," Kinmartin recalled.

Plus, he said, there was a car show at the airport and the runway was too short.

The decision to jump made, Kinmartin pointed the aircraft in the direction of Illinois farmland -- the least populated area possible -- and jumped, pulling the cord on the parachute pack he was already wearing.